This blog is dedicated to technologies, solutions and ideas that Make Wi-Fi Smarter. UMA/GAN, the 3GPP standard for providing for secure, scalable access to mobile voice, data and IMS services over IP, is being utilized with Wi-Fi to help operators grow their market positions.

Thursday, October 28, 2010

If you read this blog, chances are you're a fan of Smart Wi-Fi, powered by UMA. We're trying to harness the power of the excitement of people like you with a new video contest for anyone who loves, needs or craves being able to make calls over Wi-Fi on their smartphones.

Submit your story in a short video to WiFiCalling.net, and you could win one of three new Android smartphones.

The contest is open to participants worldwide, especially those who use T-Mobile USA’s Wi-Fi Calling, Orange’s Unik or Unique, Rogers’ Talkspot, Cincinnati Bell’s Home Run as well as people who don’t have such a service but wish they did.

We're accepting video submissions at WiFiCalling.net through November 30. On December 15, we'll announce three winners, and each will get a new Android smartphone (exact phone to be determined at time of announcement).

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Everything Everywhere, the new powerhouse operator in the UK created by the merger of Orange and T-Mobile, held an investor conference on September 28th.
In laying out their strategy for market domination, we happened to notice that UMA (aka Smart Wi-Fi) was to play a role.
This isn't that much of a surprise, given Orange UK has been quietly selling a UMA service for some time. But Orange has been mum on the service...until now. They are seeing how smart Wi-Fi can be used to help them provide everything to everyone everywhere their customers spend the most time -- the home and office.

Rogers Wireless in Canada has offered "TalkSpot", a UMA-based service, to their subscribers for some time. Just this week, they added two new Blackberry phones to the line-up, including the Bold (9700), Curve (9300) and Pearl (9100). Check out the post here. I think the upgrades were specifically to support 3G devices.

The CTIA show last week was very exciting. T-Mobile USA announced it's new built-in Wi-Fi Calling solution, based on Kineto's Smart Wi-Fi technology. It will be available in "a wide selection of Android™-powered smartphones, including the recently announced new T-Mobile® myTouch® and Motorola DEFY™ with MOTOBLUR™." Both smartphones are expected to be available in time for the holidays.

T-Mobile has offered Wi-Fi Calling for a few years, but this announcement is about expanding the service and committing to the Android OS. T-Mo stated in its announcement Wi-Fi Calling for Android is anticipated to be available on a growing selection of T-Mobile’s Android-powered smartphones in the coming months.

Per the press release: "T-Mobile’s expansion of Wi-Fi Calling to Android smartphones is an excellent innovation, and part of our ongoing initiatives on behalf of our customers to enhance indoor coverage,” said Torrie Dorrell, vice president, connected family products and services, T-Mobile USA.

The UMA and Smart Wi-Fi fans have come out of the woodwork recently and are making this busy time very exciting. Fans of the T-Mobile UMA Facebook page celebrated the news and other sites, such as TMoNews.com and GigaOm, wrote about it.

Follow the Kineto Twitter stream to receive up-to-the-minute news and read other coverage of these announcements.

What do you think about T-Mobile's commitment to Wi-Fi Calling on Android smartphones...will you run out and buy one?

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About me

I’m Steve Shaw with Kineto Wireless, the key innovator and leading supplier of solutions that enable smart offload for smartphones. Our technologies make Wi-Fi smarter so mobile operators can lower costs and improve performance of mobile services.